Blu del Barrio: Portraying Adira Tal in Star Trek: Discovery
Blu del Barrio reflected upon their transitioning journey portraying Adira Tal in Star Trek: Discovery, delving into character parallels and their found family.
When Star Trek: Discovery jumped into the 32nd century in Season Three, not only did it bring a refreshing, new perspective into its storytelling–it introduced new characters that are now essential to the crew. While the show’s primary age range has been in adulthood, the third season of Discovery finally introduced a younger point of view through Adira Tal, the non-binary Human host of the Tal symbiont. The character’s complexity of being a host of so many identities and the struggles of youth as they take on more responsibilities as a Starfleet ensign created a compelling mix that the show really needed–Adira not only becoming a valuable member but also fortifying the characterizations of their found family: Paul Stamets and Hugh Culber. Blu del Barrio, who portrayed Adira Tal in Star Trek: Discovery, reflected upon their inspiring journey working on the show as the final season draws to an emotional end: “I really appreciated that they took their time in opening up to people. I remember very vividly how rude they were in that first episode that they were in [laughs]. But it makes complete sense, you know, after going through a massive tragedy and loss, something as crazy as The Burn, to be in a ship full of people you don’t know and be only sixteen years old. I understand where they were coming from, and I really respect that they took so long to open up to anybody. I think that it was very accurate that it should be Stamets and Culber they did open up to; I had a lot of respect for them for that because I’m very much like an open book and overshare all the time with people and oftentimes don’t protect myself very much … I think they did that in a really good way.”
If there is a complex problem to be solved, Adira Tal is there to answer the call. The actor explained the approach to delivering the highly technical lines, confessing that it took more than just plain memorization. They said, “When you have these massive paragraphs of a bunch of technobabble, it makes it so hard if you don’t understand it. I would have to understand the science, whether it was real or not behind it or it just wouldn’t stick in my head, so there was so much extra work that had to go into all those lines. I’m not a science person; I was terrible in science and math, but I had to understand some semblance of what I was saying or it just wouldn’t stick.”
The found family of Adira, Gray (Ian Alexander), Stamets (Anthony Rapp) and Culber (Wilson Cruz) is one of the most compelling parts of Star Trek: Discovery. Blu del Barrio shared that this beautiful dynamic on set expanded beyond the show: “I was looking for adult figures in the queer community that I could use as mentors, so the timing was really beautiful. I consider Anthony and Wilson like parental figures in my life very much so. I also think we just get along really well … I do feel like a mini version of Anthony, and I think Ian is a mini version of Will in a lot of ways. I miss them a lot because we obviously don’t see each other as much now,” they said.
In the third episode of Discovery Season Three, People of Earth, Adira is first introduced as an inspector of the United Earth Defense Force–ultimately joining the crew of Discovery. The actor revealed that “when Adira first joined the crew, the costume that I was wearing, the one piece blue suit, was one of the first costumes that Sonequa [Martin-Green] ever wore on the show! That has always been a really fun fact in my brain that I don’t think either of us have ever said. I wore it for most of Season Three, and at the very end of it, I got my uniform with my badge … I remember feeling very cool, a lot more grounded and a lot more sturdy in that. That was a really cool experience.”
“All of my time while I was playing Adira was a huge period of transition for me … I think that our journeys really mirrored each other. I was on hormones during Season Four; I had top surgery during the show. A lot of my big transitional periods were while I was playing Adira, and the crew was the family that helped me through all of that. So it very much doesn’t feel like a character I played on a show, it feels like the time of my life during those years, because they were so interconnected. It means a lot to me … I don’t think I’ll have another experience like that ever.”
In retrospect, after three seasons of Star Trek: Discovery, Blu del Barrio reflected upon what the character of Adira Tal meant to them: “All of my time while I was playing Adira was a huge period of transition for me. I was going through a lot. I am miles different than I was when I started playing them. They are miles different than they were when they first walked on Discovery, and I think that our journeys really mirrored each other. I did that intentionally because I just wanted it to be as realistic as possible. I was on hormones during Season Four; I had top surgery during the show. A lot of my big transitional periods were while I was playing Adira, and the crew was the family that helped me through all of that. So it very much doesn’t feel like a character I played on a show, it feels like the time of my life during those years, because they were so interconnected. It means a lot to me … I don’t think I’ll have another experience like that ever.”
With only one episode left in the final season of Discovery, del Barrio shared their hopes for the future of Adira Tal. “I think it would be cool to see them pop up somewhere else as so many Trek characters have. I think that would be really awesome,” they said. Don’t miss the end of Star Trek: Discovery next week on Paramount+ and make sure to follow Blu del Barrio on Instagram.
